Okay, so I did some benchtesting of some emulators that I use frequently. ​ The tests are adapted from some of the "real world" tests that [[http://​mes.emuunlim.com|Jim]] did back in the day. I carried them out in a fresh install of System 7.5.5. ​ I used a ROM with a checksum of 06684214, emulating a 68040 processor. ​ I gave each emulated Macintosh 32 MB of RAM, 256 colors and a screen resolution of 800x600.

The first test was to open a 2.2 MB .JPG file in Graphic Converter. ​ Here's what the stopwatch told us:

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* SoftMac 2008: 5.2 seconds

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* SoftMac XP: 5.3 seconds ​

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* **Basilisk II JIT R5: 1.5 seconds**

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* **Basilisk II JIT R3: 1.5 seconds**

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* Basilisk II .9: 6 seconds

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Both Basilisk II takes the cake here. Interestingly,​ neither Basilisk II nor SoftMac has improved over the years in regard to this test. SoftMac proves slightly faster than the seven and a half year old build of Basilisk .9.

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==== Manipulating a large .JPG graphic ====

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Next, we applied Graphic Converter'​s Laplace 3x3 filter to the same .JPG file. Here's the results:

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* SoftMac 2008: 13.1 seconds

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* SoftMac XP: 13.3 seconds ​

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* **Basilisk II JIT R5: 3.1 seconds**

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* Basilisk II JIT R3: 3.5 seconds

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* Basilisk II .9: 18.8 seconds

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Basilisk II JIT R5 emerges as the fastest emulator in this test. Both Basilisk and SoftMac show marginal improvements over their older cousins (though both improvements could just be within the margin of error... i.e: the speed of my thumb on the stopwatch). ​ Here also we see how much of an improvement Basilisk II JIT is over the old non-JIT version (six times faster!)

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==== Stuffit Test One ====

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Next I did a Stuffit Test. I downloaded an archive of [[http://​main.system7today.com/​gaming_fv.html|Marathon III Infintiy]], which is 35.6 MB in size and contains a number of individual files. ​ I expanded the archive in each emulator using Stuffit 5.5. Here are the results:

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* SoftMac 2008: 7 minutes, 16 seconds

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* SoftMac XP: 7 minutes, 9 seconds ​

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* **Basilisk II JIT R5: 2 minutes, 4 seconds**

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* Basilisk II JIT R3: 2 minutes, 18 seconds

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* Basilisk II .9: 7 minutes, 25 seconds

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Whew! This test took a long time to complete! Speed-wise, SoftMac 2008 seems to be in the same league as Basilisk 2001. Basilisk II JIT takes the cake once more.

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==== Stuffit Test Two ====

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I couldn'​t bare to do another long Stuffit test, so the next test required each emulator to expand an archive of [[http://​main.system7today.com/​softwareindex/​productivity.html|Wordperfect 3.5]]. ​ The archive is 12 MB, and consists of just a single file. Here's what the clock said:

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* SoftMac 2008: 11.3 seconds

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* SoftMac XP: 11 seconds

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* Basilisk II JIT R5: 2.7 seconds

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* **Basilisk II JIT R3: 2.3 seconds**

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* Basilisk II .9: 12.6 seconds

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Again, Basilisk II JIT is the fastest. ​ This time, R3 came out slightly ahead.

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==== Installing an Application ====

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This time, the test required the emulators to install that download of Wordperfect 3.5. Here's the results:

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* SoftMac 2008: 10.8 seconds

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* SoftMac XP: 9.7 seconds

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* Basilisk II JIT R5: 3.3 seconds

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* **Basilisk II JIT R3: 3.2 seconds**

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* Basilisk II .9: 11.2 seconds

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Once again, Basilisk II JIT is the fastest emulator. ​ SoftMac 2008 actually falls behind SoftMac XP here. Both prove only slightly faster than the old non-JIT version of Basilisk II.

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===== Conclusion =====

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Obviously, Basilisk Ii JIT is the fastest emulator. ​ R5 (from 2006) is not significantly faster than R3 (from 2001). ​ Likewise, the beta of SoftMac XP from 2008 is not significantly faster than SoftMac XP from 2002. Both SoftMac versions are only slightly faster than Basilisk II .9 from January of 2001. It would seem, then, that speed-wise, we haven'​t really seen any major improvements in the last seven years.